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Development and design

Cheerilee shares her design and name with a Generation 3 Earth pony. She is a unicorn pony in My Little Pony Crystal Princess: The Runaway Rainbow, and her design was combined with Cherry Blossom to create her Core 7 incarnation, which developed into her current appearance. In the Core 7 series, she is the older sister of Scootaloo and her main personality trait is intelligence. In the current Generation 4, Cheerilee has a sister[1] but has no indicated familial relationship with Scootaloo.

Her first significant role is in Call of the Cutie, in which she teaches her students about cutie marks and explains their purpose. Even though she has a speaking part, her name is not stated on-screen. She shows the students photos of herself as a young child and as a teenager, with no cutie mark. She compassionately tells her class that her cutie mark symbolizes her care for each of her students, and her desire to help them learn and grow. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon interrupt class by passing a note to Apple Bloom, and Cheerilee asks Apple Bloom to show the note to the class; the note is blank, and Diamond Tiara remarks that so is Apple Bloom's flank.

A filly bearing a striking resemblance to Cheerilee appears in the play that Rarity designed costumes for when she was a filly, during the episode The Cutie Mark Chronicles. She is the second filly to the left, wearing a dandelion costume.

"Let's quiet down please, we have a very important lesson to get to, thank you..."

— Cheerilee

In The Show Stoppers, she hosts the school's talent show, advising the Cutie Mark Crusaders to participate in hopes that it will help them discover their special talents. She serves as the show's host, while Spike hands out the awards for her.

Season two

Taking her students on a tour.

In the opening sequence of The Return of Harmony Part 1, Cheerilee takes her students on a tour of the Canterlot statue gardens, teaching them about the various statues and pointing out the symbolism behind each one. As the class stops in front of a large statue depicting a draconequus, Cheerilee asks for her students' own opinions in regards to the statue's meaning. The Cutie Mark Crusaders, who at the time were arguing among themselves, start a fight over statue's meaning, with Scootaloo claiming it represented "chaos", while Sweetie Belle claimed it was "evil". Cheerilee breaks up the fight, reveals that the draconequus statue is Discord, while telling the three fillies that all of them where right. Nonetheless, she punishes the Cutie Mark Crusaders by making them write an essay about discord. She then prompts them to quit fighting for the remainder of the field trip.

Near the beginning of Lesson Zero, Spike mentions as part of Twilight Sparkle's checklist that they returned a blackboard to Cheerilee; this is the first time on the show that her name is mentioned, though her name and design was used almost a year prior to that, in the January 2011 McDonald's Happy Meal toy sets. Her name is subsequently mentioned in Luna Eclipsed, as Pinkie Pie and her group of fillies went to her house during the Nightmare Night festivities to go trick-or-treating.

Cheerilee likes Apple Bloom's loopty-hooping skills.

Cheerilee appears in The Cutie Pox where she takes a fascination in Apple Bloom's new cutie mark and her "special talent" which was supposedly loopty-hooping, asking for a lesson in how to do it. She is equally fascinated when Apple Bloom gets a second cutie mark whose talent was spinning plates on sticks, assuming it to be a second hidden talent when in reality Apple Bloom cast one of Zecora's spells on herself. This is also the first episode where Cheerilee is addressed by name and in person by the other characters.

She also appears in Secret of My Excess, shown walking with her groceries when she accidentally bumps into Spike. While Spike apologizes and helps Cheerilee with her groceries, he tells Cheerilee that it is his birthday. Surprised about this, Cheerilee wishes happy birthday to Spike and gives him a feathered hat as a present.

She appears in Family Appreciation Day. She is first seen with Filthy Rich as he makes his Family Appreciation Day speech to her class. Afterwards, she accidentally calls him Mr. Filthy. Later she comes to Sweet Apple Acres to talk to Granny Smith. She is briefly deceived by Apple Bloom into thinking Granny cannot speak before the class, but Granny tells her she can, much to Cheerilee's confusion. She is later seen at the back of the class room when Granny Smith tells her story.

Cheerilee with Big Mac in Hearts and Hooves Day.

Cheerilee gets an episode more centered on her in Hearts and Hooves Day, where she reveals that she lacks a significant other. The Cutie Mark Crusaders then attempted to get Cheerilee a date for Hearts and Hooves Day, finally settling on Apple Bloom's big brother Big McIntosh. When their initial meeting went nowhere, the Cutie Mark Crusaders' devised a love potion to get them hitched under the guise of a simple taste test. However, the reaction proved too strong resulting in Cheerilee and Big Mac becoming obsessed with one another. Since an hour of separation cures the spell, Sweetie Belle took Cheerilee to Carousel Boutique in order to fake picking out a wedding dress in order to keep them apart. However, Big Mac returns to Carousel Boutique soon before the spell wears off and Cheerilee dashes out to greet him, severely damaging Carousel Boutique in the process. Fortunately, the time needed to keep them apart had expired and the two returned to normal, though Cheerilee wondered why she was wearing a wedding veil. The Cutie Mark Crusaders come clean and while Cheerilee expresses appreciation for the effort, she still punishes the Cutie Mark Crusaders by having them do Big McIntosh's work.

Well, happy birthday, Cheerilee!

She appears briefly near the beginning of in A Friend in Deed, where Pinkie Pie wishes her a happy birthday.

In Ponyville Confidential, she appoints Diamond Tiara as the editor-in-chief of the school newspaper. She later strips her of her position after Diamond Tiara turns the paper into a gossip tabloid and blackmails the Cutie Mark Crusaders into getting embarrassing stories about other ponies. Cheerilee then appoints Featherweight as the new editor.

In Filli Vanilli, she appears in the audience, fainting at the Pony Tones' performance when Big Mac lip-syncs with "Flutterguy." She also eventually requests them to play a song for her class. She also appears in For Whom the Sweetie Belle Toils as a stage director for Sweetie Belle's play, and in Trade Ya!, she appears in the background along with colt Hoops while Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash attempt to get an antique chicken for Stellar Eclipse. In Inspiration Manifestation, she appears in the background three times during and after the Foal and Filly Faire along with Truffle Shuffle. During Equestria Games, Cheerilee is seen twice in the audience right under the royalty box just before Twilight sits down at her seat.

Depiction in films

My Little Pony Equestria Girls

Cheerilee with Twilight in the library in Equestria Girls.

Cheerilee's human counterpart makes an appearance in My Little Pony Equestria Girls as both a teacher and a librarian. Contrary to her pony counterpart, she has light pink skin and dark purple hair. In one of her appearances, she confiscates the speaker that the Cutie Mark Crusaders used to play their theme song's video on the library computer. Her last appearance is in the crowd after Sunset Shimmer's attack on the school.

Of Friendship is Magic Issue #29, she appears on cover A, and in the story, "Cherilee[sic] gets a visit from her sister who happens to be one of the most famous wrestlers in Equestria! A long-simmering grudge between the siblings threatens to explode unless Rarity and friends can figure out a way for the two to mend hurt feelings."[1]

Personality

As a teacher, Cheerilee is portrayed as kind, patient, and determined to shape her students' morals. However, she is also reasonably strict and disciplinary, such as scolding the Cutie Mark Crusaders in The Return of Harmony Part 1 and stripping Diamond Tiara of her editor-in-chief position in Ponyville Confidential. She also has moments of generosity, shown when she spontaneously gives Spike a feathered hat for his birthday in Secret of My Excess.

Merchandise

Cheerilee is frequently featured in Hasbro's toy line, with her cutie mark almost always using the alternate design on the toys themselves but sometimes using the in-show design on their packaging. Her model for some of toys is sometimes the same model used for Pinkie Pie's toys, and sometimes for Applejack's toys. As noted above, her name was used in the toy line almost a year prior to its first mention in the show.

A Cheerilee mini-figure toy and collector card appear under the number 13 in the second EU wave of mystery packs, respectively using a repaint and recolor of Applejack's Earth pony mold and model. Her colors are mostly the same as in the show, while her cutie mark uses the alternate design. According to the collector card, Cheerilee "is a wonderful teacher!" Another mini-figure of Cheerilee, using a repaint of Pinkie Pie's Earth pony mold and using the in-show cutie mark design, has been displayed at the 2013 New York Toy Fair[4] and is included in the Pony Lesson Set with Twist-a-loo, Silver Spoon, and unnamed Smarty Pants. A November 6, 2013 "vorläufige Abbildung" image for mystery packs depicts Cheerilee as in the show.

Other depictions

Cheerilee's appearances outside of the show often use an alternate cutie mark design: a smiling flower with two smaller flowers and four green leaves, as opposed to three smiling flowers with pink petals.

Cheerilee is one of the available characters in the Valentine's Day version of the game Card Creator.

HubNetwork.com description

Kind, patient Cheerilee always wanted to be a teacher. Her cutie mark, a trio of flowers, symbolizes how she helps pupils bloom. She's dedicated to teaching little ponies like Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, and Sweetie Belle at the Ponyville Schoolhouse.

Cheerilee is one of the available playable characters in Gameloft's mobile game. Early previews of the game sometimes listed her as Cheerilee Pie[6][7] instead of Cheerilee.[8]

My Little Pony mobile game description

A teacher at the Ponyville Schoolhouse, Cheerilee adores all of her students.

Quotes

"I had decided to become a teacher, and the flowers symbolized my hope that I could help my future students bloom if I nurture them with knowledge. The smiles represented the cheer I hope to bring to my little ponies while they were learning."